Stainless Steel RFID Blocking Passport Wallet

We put together a gift guide for hackers with the help of MIT engineer & hacker, Limor "Ladyada" Fried - and got some of her top recommendations in the realm of all things open source electronics and hacker gear.

Upadate December 2, 2013: When Limor told me about Adafruit's massive sale going on right now, I decided we had to update this great guide Limor helped me put together last year.

This products in this guide are updated on every page, further because Adafruit is having a massive Cyber Monday Sale that is going until 11:59pm Eastern time December 2 (today), or until this page is changed.

The Stainless Steel RFID Blocking Passport Wallet ($85, photo above) is an RFID blocking wallet that keeps all your RFID enabled cards - also RFID enabled forms of ID such as your passport - safe from identity theft. I have one and it's thin yet really tough; its woven microfibers give the wallet a texture of silk over leather and the steel is an attractive matte silver.

Teensy++ (AT90USB1286 USB Dev Board) and Header Kit

The Teensy++ (AT90USB1286 USB dev board) + Header ($27.50; laterst version, 2.0) is a complete USB-based microcontoller development system - but it's only bite-sized, and works with Mac X, Linux and Windows. All programming is done via the USB port: no special programmer is needed, only a standard "Mini-B" USB cable and a PC or Macintosh with a USB port. This board has tons of FLASH, RAM, pins and more.

NeTV WiFi Internet and Android HDTV peripheral

NeTV ($119) is a fully open source HDTV peripheral which brings WiFi Internet and Android mobile interfacing to any HDMI TV.

It's the first offering from the brand new Sutajio Ko-Usagi, the Open Source Hardware company led by "bunnie" Huang. bunnie is best known as the author of "Hacking the XBox" and was the lead hardware engineer of the chumby internet alarm clock.

Router hackers: USB to TTL Console Cable / Raspberry Pi

The USB to TTL Serial Cable - Debug / Console Cable ($9.95) is an easy way to connect to a microcontroller/Raspberry Pi/WiFi router serial console port. It's pictured above with the Raspberry Pi($39.95), a credit-card sized computer that plugs into your TV and a keyboard; it can used for many of the things that your desktop PC does, like spreadsheets, word-processing and games and can play high-definition video. It's Linux based and can be hacked to to tons of stuff - the only limit is your imagination.

Inside the big USB plug is a USB<->Serial conversion chip and at the end of the 36" cable are four wire - red power, black ground, white RX into USB port, and green TX out of the USB port. The power pin provides the 500mA direct from the USB port and the RX/TX pins are 3.3V level for interfacing with the most common 3.3V logic level chipsets.

Hackerspace Passport

The Hackerspace phenomena is taking over the world: there are now over 1000 Hackerspaces - places where all kinds of hackers co-work - around the globe.

They are a lot of fun to visit; hackers know that they can find a corner of the hacker community in any town they travel to when visiting a Hackerspace. And we all know it's neat to look over your regular passport to see all the stamps showing where you've traveled. Having a Hackerspace Passport makes visiting different Hackerspaces fun when you start collecting global Hackerspace stamps (or stickers).

The Hackerspace Passport ($2.95) is tough and features silver embossing, and is intended to last a lifetime.

MaKey MaKey

The MaKey MaKey ($49.95) is a simple kit for beginners and experts alike: it turns everyday objects into touchpads (via alligator clips) and combines them with the internet. MaKey MaKey was invented by Jay Silver and Eric Rosenbaum and made by JoyLabz - I highly recommend you look at this MIT post about what incredibly cool stuff hackers are doing with it.

Hackerscout Badges

It's time for a very different kind of "Scouts" - don't you think? Adafruit has "scout badges" (and stickers) of achievement for learning skills such as soldering, Kinect hacking, learning programming, welding, electronics, science and engineering and more.

The Hackerscout Skill Badges ($2.95-$3.95) are part of Adafruit's Hackerscouts aim to create an open, all-gender movement around learning and inventing that encourages informal education with an emphasis on thinking outside limitations.

Beagle USB 12 Protocol Analyzer

The Beagle USB 12 Protocol Analyzer ($399.95) is a non-intrusive and reliable tool with which to perform functions such as reverse engineer a USB device, lend a hand with enumeration, for real time data capture analysis, and is perfect for when a problem is bad enough it crashes the USB host. Data is captured in real time, saved and parsed.

For your littlest hackers: Ladyada's E is For Electronics coloring book

Ladyada's "E is for Electronics" ($9.95) is a coloring book adventure with electronic components and their inventors - it features diverse and easily understood learning and inventing situations, and depicts inventors and engineers as people of all genders, races and abilities.

TV-B-Gone Kit - Universal

Designed by Ladyada and Hackerspace founder Mitch Altman, the TV-B-Gone Universal ($19.50) shuts off LCD TV's from a distance, so you never have to be annoyed by ads when you want to eat in a public space again. This is an ultra-high-power, open source kit version of the first popular TV-B-Gone.

Ladyada's Hacker Gift Guide

UPDATED for 2013. Give gifts that inspire your favorite hackers to make something great. Our exclusive Hacker Gift Guide features Ladyada's top gifts for hackers of all styles, ages and interests.

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Stainless Steel RFID Blocking Passport Wallet

We put together a gift guide for hackers with the help of MIT engineer & hacker, Limor "Ladyada" Fried - and got some of her top recommendations in the realm of all things open source electronics and hacker gear.

Upadate December 2, 2013: When Limor told me about Adafruit's massive sale going on right now, I decided we had to update this great guide Limor helped me put together last year.

This products in this guide are updated on every page, further because Adafruit is having a massive Cyber Monday Sale that is going until 11:59pm Eastern time December 2 (today), or until this page is changed.

The Stainless Steel RFID Blocking Passport Wallet ($85, photo above) is an RFID blocking wallet that keeps all your RFID enabled cards - also RFID enabled forms of ID such as your passport - safe from identity theft. I have one and it's thin yet really tough; its woven microfibers give the wallet a texture of silk over leather and the steel is an attractive matte silver.